A LORRY driver has been jailed for six years following the death of a Handbridge removals man and five others in a horror smash.

Good Samaritan David Cooper, along with two other people, had been trying to help the victims of an earlier crash when they were hit by Brian France's 12-ton Sainsbury's HGV.

The 55-year-old was sentenced at York Crown Court on Monday after he admitted six counts of causing death by dangerous driving. He was also banned from the wheel for eight years.

The accident happened on the A1(M) in North Yorkshire, on November 11 last year, after France, who said he wished he had died rather than live with the guilt, failed to spot the wreckage that lay ahead.

Judge Paul Hoffman heard he was probably reading when his articulated lorry ploughed into vehicles from the earlier pile-up and killed six people.

He told France: 'I conclude you were reading from a piece of paper in one hand and steering with the other and, for a very significant time and distance, abandoned effective control over a heavy lorry when driving at maximum speed, almost on auto-pilot, on a motorway.'

France, who is from Barnsley, was working for Sainsbury's on the day of the tragedy.

Prosecutor Andrew Dallas said professional driver France was guilty of 'alarming' driving and failed to see the danger ahead.

'France set his truck on cruise control at the maximum speed of 55mph and for half a mile, or over 20 seconds, had in front of him a conspicuous accident in which a bright yellow lorry, showing hazard warning lights, was sticking out into the roadway and a man was frantically waving to warn oncoming traffic,' he said.

He said it had been thought France, whose lorry was seen swerving and drifting from side to side, was either drunk, had nodded off or was reading a de-briefing document which was later found in his lorry cab, near the steering wheel.

Tests proved France had not been drinking and Mr Dallas said the driver, who was spotted looking down and reading, had failed to notice what was ahead because of a combination of tiredness and lack of concentration.

He said: 'Six people died because this lorry driver did not see or react to the danger ahead of an accident scene and, putting it objectively, he is guilty of gross and protracted failure to watch the road ahead of him.

'There was an obvious and conspicuous hazard which had been seen by other motorists but he, without the slightest deviation or braking before the impact, struck the protruding lorry and started a chain reaction.'

The horror began when a Vauxhall Carlton car hit a motorway barrier and overturned, following which a couple in a Range Rover stopped to help.

It was then that Mr Cooper, who was driving for Lowes of Chester, also stopped, and left his van with its rear end sticking out slightly from the hard shoulder, to protect the scene.

Mr Dallas said this situation should have been spotted by France, but instead his lorry hit the van, pushed it over the top of the Vauxhall and shunted the whole lot up the road before it came to stop after colliding with the Range Rover.

The Good Samaritans who got out to help were killed instantly, and three people travelling in the Vauxhall died.

Those trapped in the car who died were: Karen McCutcheon, 39, a student, and her aircraft engineer husband Colin, 44, from Aberdeen, and Mrs McCutcheon's sister, Sandra Jennings, 37, a social worker, from York.

The couple who stopped to assist with Mr Cooper were Stephen Maddison, 43, a plant fitter, and his wife Wendy, 39, a business manager, of North Yorkshire.

Jailing France, Judge Hoffman said: 'You careered at maximum speed into a stationary hazard, conspicuous and obvious. I find it unlikely that at that time of day you fell asleep as you are described as being meticulous in keeping to your driving hours.'